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Honor Code In The Knight's Tale

204 Words1 Pages
In the first tale in the anthology, “The Knight’s Tale”, Theseus very much follows the medieval chivalry honor code. Even though the point of such a code is to bring honor and glory to one who follows it, Chaucer points out that chivalry can sometimes compel one to act without heroics or honor. For example, after discovering the desecration of the corpses, Theseus thinks it is wise to then sack Thebes and desecrate even more corpses. Nowhere in chivalry does an eye for an eye appear, so it would appear that Theseus does not practice what he preaches. Also, when Theseus comes across Arcite and Palamon dueling, his quarrel with them is not over dueling, but it is because they weren’t dueling correctly. It would be very odd that a knight would
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